My baby is a poop machine (maybe a little TMI)

[mama*pisces]

DD is 3.5 months old, is exclusively breastfed, and has been pooping like CRAZY for the past couple of weeks or so. She did a lot in the beginning, then it tapered off to once a day, and all of a sudden it's back with a vengeance. I just changed the third poopy diaper of the day. It mostly looks normal, but yesterday I noticed that it looked kinda mucousy(?). This was after I drank some milk for the first time in a couple of days. Dairy intolerance, perhaps? But if this was the case, wouldn't she be fussy and have green mucousy poop all the time? She is pretty much a happy baby most of the time, and her poop is usually yellow/mustardy, most of the time thick, sometimes watery. She's also had 2 or 3 middle of the night BLOW-OUTS, of course, when I can barely keep my eyes open.:yawning I don't remember ds ever pooping in the middle of the night...

Does all of this sound normal? Please don't tell me I have to give up dairy...again....I can handle giving up milk but I must have my cheese.

[Llyra]

I think it's probably fine. I think that you'll drive yourself crazy if you watch baby poop too much. There are so many things that can be happening that cause changes to happen-- what you're eating, a runny nose, a GI infection that baby is fighting off, how much baby is nursing, etc. I would say that if baby is otherwise healthy and happy, and growing normally, you can safely label whatever comes out as normal, barring blood in the stool or similar alarming things.

At that age, my twins were nursing from the same breasts. DS pooped once daily, like clockwork. DD2 still pooped with every feed some days, and then would go two weeks without, and then another week or two of constant pooping, etc. And sometimes it would be yellow, or brown, or both, or greenish, or a bit mucousy, or even orange sometimes. The consistency varied a lot, and for awhile we had vinegar-smelling poops that we eventually traced to mama eating too many blueberries.

I would think that if it's dairy, you'll see it getting steadily worse, and then you know. But I wouldn't jump to that conclusion after only a few weird poos.

[lisalu100]

LOL, I was wondering about the weird vinegar poop today - I've been eating blueberries all week!

[mama*pisces]

Originally Posted by Llyra

DD2 still pooped with every feed some days, and then would go two weeks without, and then another week or two of constant pooping, etc. And sometimes it would be yellow, or brown, or both, or greenish, or a bit mucousy, or even orange sometimes. The consistency varied a lot, and for awhile we had vinegar-smelling poops that we eventually traced to mama eating too many blueberries.

I would think that if it's dairy, you'll see it getting steadily worse, and then you know. But I wouldn't jump to that conclusion after only a few weird poos.

Thanks, this makes me feel better.

[red and lulu]

my dd went through the same thing at the same age! i posted about it, too — i i was convinced something had to be wrong. there was just so much poop! and i'm a vegan, so it couldn't have been dairy. someone said it was maybe because of the increased saliva she started producing in response to teething (they swallow a lot)... i don't know if that's true, but i'm happy to report her poop is back to normal (she's almost 4.5 mo).

(the middle of the night blowouts were the worst. especially the one followed by an unshielded poop across the dresser as i was looking for a clean diaper, of which there were none. they were all wet in the washing machine. a fml moment, for sure.)

[mama*pisces]

Originally Posted by CJsMama

my dd went through the same thing at the same age! i posted about it, too — i i was convinced something had to be wrong. there was just so much poop! and i'm a vegan, so it couldn't have been dairy. someone said it was maybe because of the increased saliva she started producing in response to teething (they swallow a lot)... i don't know if that's true, but i'm happy to report her poop is back to normal (she's almost 4.5 mo).

(the middle of the night blowouts were the worst. especially the one followed by an unshielded poop across the dresser as i was looking for a clean diaper, of which there were none. they were all wet in the washing machine. a fml moment, for sure.)

The bolded part actually makes sense to me....maybe that's why it was weird looking that one time. She's definitely teething.

about the last part...oh my!! Nothing to that degree has happened(knock on wood), though one of her favorite things to do is poop right after I get her into her nighttime diaper, and I only have 3 of the really heavy duty night time inserts. So frustrating...

[writteninkursive]

She could have a mild virus or something. Mucous in poop is usually an intestinal reaction to infection, although that may be a bit different in babies.
The milk thing could be a concern, since you noticed this after just drinking milk for the first time in awhile. Hear me out on this, because it was a hard lesson for me:
If you're buying milk from the grocery store, there's about a 60% chance for each carton you buy that the milk contains micobacterium avium paratuberculosis (MAP), which is a bacteria secreted by pus and is produced by nearly all herds of cattle used for commercial dairy products. The FDA allows one drop of pus per every 8 ounces of the product, and that pus is suspect to causing Crohn's Disease and other intestinal problems.
I have an autoimmune disease that affects my intestines. My family is predisposed to autoimmune diseases (gout, rheumatoid arthritis, among others), but I knew very little of it when I had my first child.
When my daughter was a few months old, she started getting bouts of running, mucousy diarrhea. She would be fine one day and have totally liquid poop the next. The doctors didn't know what that was about. They shrugged it off, but this child, every single time she pooped - maybe 8 times a day - the poop would leak out the sides of diapers and all over everything. EVERY single poop was like that. I had no idea that it was abnormal, her being my first child. When my second daughter was born, we had very much the opposite problem. She was constipated as can be from a few months on. Again, nobody knew why. They prescribed her meds for it (she now uses only probiotics, which work like a charm!), but nothing helped for the longest time. When my son was born (he's three months now), I'm more dedicated to breastfeeding him. At first, I was drinking milk and consuming a lot of commercial and processed dairy. And I would get immediate problems with it myself, and then my son would. His poop turned dark greenish and was full of mucous. So I started researching, and found out some pretty scary information about commercial cow milk. Long story short, we switched to rice milk (because soy milk is owned, literally, owned by Monsanto - the devil ). We drink Rice Dream, and NOBODY has had any bowel problems since (with the exception of me still cutting out my processed foods that contain dairy). Milk in America is such a nasty deal. If you're going to drink cow milk, definitely look for something local and something 100% organic and grass-fed. Or you (and baby) could end up with lifelong intestinal problems.
So maybe that isn't the problem at all. But there's a chance! So I had to share. Sorry that was rantish.

[mama*pisces]

Originally Posted by writteninkursive

She could have a mild virus or something. Mucous in poop is usually an intestinal reaction to infection, although that may be a bit different in babies.
The milk thing could be a concern, since you noticed this after just drinking milk for the first time in awhile. Hear me out on this, because it was a hard lesson for me:
If you're buying milk from the grocery store, there's about a 60% chance for each carton you buy that the milk contains micobacterium avium paratuberculosis (MAP), which is a bacteria secreted by pus and is produced by nearly all herds of cattle used for commercial dairy products. The FDA allows one drop of pus per every 8 ounces of the product, and that pus is suspect to causing Crohn's Disease and other intestinal problems. I have an autoimmune disease that affects my intestines. My family is predisposed to autoimmune diseases (gout, rheumatoid arthritis, among others), but I knew very little of it when I had my first child.
When my daughter was a few months old, she started getting bouts of running, mucousy diarrhea. She would be fine one day and have totally liquid poop the next. The doctors didn't know what that was about. They shrugged it off, but this child, every single time she pooped - maybe 8 times a day - the poop would leak out the sides of diapers and all over everything. EVERY single poop was like that. I had no idea that it was abnormal, her being my first child. When my second daughter was born, we had very much the opposite problem. She was constipated as can be from a few months on. Again, nobody knew why. They prescribed her meds for it (she now uses only probiotics, which work like a charm!), but nothing helped for the longest time. When my son was born (he's three months now), I'm more dedicated to breastfeeding him. At first, I was drinking milk and consuming a lot of commercial and processed dairy. And I would get immediate problems with it myself, and then my son would. His poop turned dark greenish and was full of mucous. So I started researching, and found out some pretty scary information about commercial cow milk. Long story short, we switched to rice milk (because soy milk is owned, literally, owned by Monsanto - the devil ). We drink Rice Dream, and NOBODY has had any bowel problems since (with the exception of me still cutting out my processed foods that contain dairy). Milk in America is such a nasty deal. If you're going to drink cow milk, definitely look for something local and something 100% organic and grass-fed. Or you (and baby) could end up with lifelong intestinal problems.
So maybe that isn't the problem at all. But there's a chance! So I had to share. Sorry that was rantish.

Yikes. I knew cow's milk is not as healthy as a lot of people think, but I did not know THAT. I love Rice Dream, and I will stick to that. Thanks for the rantish, informative post.

She actually does have a cold now(that big brother graciously shared with her), and has been so full of mucous that she's been almost choking on it. I am staying far away from ALL dairy for the next few days, for sure. She is doing much better than she was yesterday though...I am so grateful for the immune-boosting qualities in mama milk.